U.S. now targets $40,000 SUV in cash laundering

Updated 12:38 am, Friday, October 12, 2012

Photo: Foto De Cortesía, TYR

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TOMAS YARRINGTON RUVALCABA

TOMAS YARRINGTON RUVALCABA

Photo: Foto De Cortesía, TYR

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Sindy Chapa is a former assistant professor and former Associate Director of the Center for the Study of Latino Media and Markets at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Texas State University.

Sindy Chapa is a former assistant professor and former Associate Director of the Center for the Study of Latino Media and Markets at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Texas State University.

Photo: Texas State University

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The home of Sindy Chapa on 1019 Fairway, Kyle, TX . IRS agents are seeking forfeiture of a Texas State professor's house as part of a money laundering probe. They're going after the home of Sindy Chapa, 37, a professor of journalism and mass communication. They're also going after a house in McAllen. The feds' reasoning for seeking the property is in a sealed document, and Chapa's not been charged with a crime, but the case is apparently part of the ongoing investigation into the alleged money laundering activities of Tomas Yarrington, the former governor of Tamaulipas.

The home of Sindy Chapa on 1019 Fairway, Kyle, TX . IRS agents are seeking forfeiture of a Texas State professor's house as part of a money laundering probe. They're going after the home of Sindy Chapa, 37, a

A side view of the front of the home located at 9801 Nrth Ware Road McAllen, Texas Monday Sept.10, 2012. IRS agents are seeking forfeiture of a Texas State professor's house as part of a money laundering probe. They're going after the home of Sindy Chapa, 37, a professor of journalism and mass communication. They're also going after a house in McAllen. The feds' reasoning for seeking the property is in a sealed document, and Chapa's not been charged with a crime, but the case is apparently part of the ongoing investigation into the alleged money laundering activities of Tomas Yarrington, the former governor of Tamaulipas.

A side view of the front of the home located at 9801 Nrth Ware Road McAllen, Texas Monday Sept.10, 2012. IRS agents are seeking forfeiture of a Texas State professor's house as part of a money laundering probe.

Federal prosecutors in San Antonio are trying to seize a luxury vehicle from a former public works director for the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, part of an ongoing money laundering investigation into the state's former governor.

The prosecutors this week filed a civil suit to take an Audi Q7 SUV owned by Alberto Berlanga Bolado, the former public works director for the state that borders Texas from Brownsville to Laredo.

Berlanga's 2011 SUV, valued at more than $40,000 on edmunds.com, was impounded in May as Drug Enforcement Administration and IRS agents served search warrants across South Texas, including at his office on Broadway and Sunset Road.

The searches and seizures all were part of an investigation into Tomás Yarrington Ruvalcaba, 55, a former mayor from the border city of Matamoros who served in Mexico's congress and as governor of Tamaulipas from 1999 to 2005.

Yarrington isn't charged in this country, but he is wanted in Mexico, and U.S. prosecutors claim in court documents that he took bribes from Mexico's drug cartels and laundered the money in Texas.

The 46 acres near Fiesta Texas are owned by a company with ties to Berlanga called Cantera-Parkway Development Partners of SA.

Berlanga and the company are fighting the feds' efforts to take the property, arguing the acreage was paid for through a loan and legitimately earned money.

According to Mexican media reports, one of Berlanga's companies in Mexico received tens of millions of dollars in construction contracts from Tamaulipas, much of it while he was public works director there.

He currently lives in Terrell Hills, but could not be located for comment Thursday at his home or office and has not responded to past inquiries from the San Antonio Express-News.

His lawyer, Brownsville attorney Gilberto Hinojosa, said he'll be contesting the forfeiture of the vehicle as well.

Berlanga, who served under Yarrington's successor, knows Cano and has met Yarrington, but is not close to either, Hinojosa said.

The property and the vehicle “were acquired through legitimate funding,” Hinojosa said. He noted that the government's reasons for seizing the property are under seal.

“So we don't know what the basis of any of these allegations are,” Hinojosa said.

Joel Androphy, who represents Yarrington, said his client is innocent and isn't connected with the Texas properties.

“Somebody should go in and fight these forfeiture cases, whoever's property it is,” Androphy says. “But it's not ours. If it was, we'd be fighting them.”